Good morning, wonderful people, and welcome back to the grind. We hope those of you clocking back in at work are looking forward to a smooth day — and that those of you reading us from Sahel are enjoying a well-earned break.

ALSO BACK- Rolling blackouts — with electricity in many districts of the capital city being switched off for 60-minute stretches 2-4 times a day for the past week or so. Hardly a cool development with the mercury having settled in the 40-45°C band. We have the lowdown in this morning’s news well, below.

And speaking of holidays: We have 66 days to go before our next holiday long weekend, which comes at the end of September in observance of the Prophet Muhammad’s birthday.

ELECTION 2024- We’re going to get a timeline for the presidential elections soon: The National Elections Authority plans to announce the timeline for the 2024 presidential election soon, according to state-run news agency MENA. The process should begin by 1 December 2023 at the latest, with the constitution requiring that the elections take place at least 120 days before the end of the current presidential term on 2 April 2024, National Dialogue Technical Secretariat head Mahmoud Fawzi previously said.

HAPPENING THIS WEEK-

The National Dialogue will resume sessions tomorrow, Kamal Zayed, a member of the dialogue’s board of trustees, told Al Masry Al Youm last week. The dialogue kicked off in May, holding three weekly sessions discussing political, economic, and social issues.

When does the national dialogue process end? Sessions have been on pause since the Eid Al Adha break, and officials have said it’s too early to tell when the public policy-making fest might wrap up.

It’s Fed week: The Federal Reserve will hold its two-day policy meeting on Tuesday and Wednesday this week. An unexpectedly large slowdown in inflation in June has the markets more sure than ever that the central bank will soon call time on its aggressive tightening cycle and avoid a so-called ‘hard landing.’

Samsung will unveil two updated flagship foldable phones on Wednesday, the Verge reports, suggesting you should look out for the Galaxy Z Flip 5 and Z Fold 5 as well as two new watches and, potentially, an S9 Plus, and S9 Ultra, and a Tab S9.

PSA-: Apple is raising the subscription price in Egypt of its monthly iCloud+ 200 GB plan to EGP 99.99 from EGP 54.99 as of 19 August, according to an email seen by Enterprise. Subscription prices for 50 GB plans come in at EGP 29.99 and 2 TB EGP 349.99, Apple reports.

HAPPENING NEXT WEEK-

Egypt is hosting another round of Palestinian talks: Heads of various Palestinian factions will convene in Cairo next Sunday for reconciliation talks, Al Arabiya reported yesterday. Egyptian intelligence chief Abbas Kamel met with a delegation from the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine on Saturday to prepare for the meeting.

THE BIG STORIES ABROAD-

There’s no single story dominating the global conversation this morning:

  • Deadlock in Spain: Yesterday’s elections in Spain produced no clear winner, leaving the country in uncertainty as the two leading parties try to put together coalitions. ( Reuters | Associated Press | Washington Post
  • Creative brand destruction? Twitter owner Elon Musk plans to jettison the company’s iconic blue bird logo in favor of an X, writing yesterday that “soon we shall bid adieu to the twitter brand and, gradually, all the birds.” ( Financial Times Wall Street Journal
  • It’s a big day for Israel’s far right: Israeli lawmakers are set to vote on divisive reforms driven by Netanyahu’s far-right coalition that would hand the government new powers over the judiciary. ( Bloomberg | New York Times)

WATCH THIS SPACE- The United States could be looking down the barrel of multiple labor strikes that threaten to throw a monkey wrench into a surging economy, Politico reports.

CIRCLE YOUR CALENDARS- The Enterprise Finance Forum is taking place on 18-19 September at the St. Regis Hotel in Cairo. This flagship forum is the latest in our must-attend series of invitation-only, C-suite-level gatherings that allow senior members of our community to openly and frankly discuss critical issues in key sectors of the economy.

TAP OR CLICK HERE if you want to express interest in attending. We’ll be sending out the first batch of invitations soon.

Do you want to become a commercial partner? Ping a note to Moustafa Taalab, our head of commercial, or fill out this form and we’ll be in touch.

DID YOU MISS THE ENTERPRISE EXPORTS AND FDI FORUM? Tune in to the Enterprise Podcast and listen for yourself : The Enterprise Podcast is back with another installment of our forum series, where we bring you audio recordings of what was said on stage at the Enterprise Exports and FDI Forum, which took place in May.

WANT TO LISTEN? Head to: Apple Podcast | Spotify | Google Podcast | Anghami . We’re releasing a new episode every Sunday morning.

IN THIS WEEK’S EPISODE- We ask some of the biggest multinationals and suppliers operating here — namely, in logistics, e-commerce, and FMCG — what it is they’re looking for in a local partner, product or service and what are some of the pain points they’ve had to deal with. We were joined on that panel by Khaled Morsy, CEO of DB Schenker Egypt, Omar Elsahy, General Manager at Amazon Egypt, Tarek Kame l, Chairman and CEO of Nestlé Egypt and Sudan.

*** It’s Blackboard day: We have our weekly look at the business of education in Egypt, from pre-K through the highest reaches of higher ed.

In today’s issue: Non-tuition fees are helping international and private schools get around gov’t-imposed fee caps and soften the impact of inflation.

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